Global Broadcast Fail.

PH’s company occasionally tries to remedy their ineptitude by committing to global webcasts.   At the end of the broadcast, there is generally a Q&A session, where the MD answers questions people have submitted anonymously.  PH was positively gleeful during this webcast when a great percentage of the questions were dedicated to utterly slamming her department.  The queries included but not limited to:  how internal announcements came through and are communicated, the cost of the department vs. generating revenue, and a few other backhanded slaps.

After Bubbles and PH got a verbal positive nod from the MD, she thoroughly enjoyed the severe level of questioning the rest of the company had grilling her department.

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“Incorrect use of quotes.”

When the Director sends e-mails, they are all cringe worthy – nothing more so than seeing a candidate is available to interview “in person.”  PH is confused, how does one be available for an interview “in person?”

World War Desk.

As PH may have previously mentioned, the Director is growing the Recruitment Division at a nearly obscene rate.  In doing so, she’s literally taken over the office and began encroaching the team’s space into the rest of the office – no less than bumping the Director of HR out of his desk while he was on a business trip to S. Africa.  PH feels a lot of tension brewing, and does not feel a particular professional courtesy when the Director e-mails her with comments like these “I dont know how many times I asked Moron (HR Assistant) to move herself and Ginger (Head of HR) BEFORE his return.”

PH doesn’t care where anyone sits.   At the same time, she can’t wait to see how this situation plays out.  It’s like the Director missed the day of class when everyone else learned how to play nicely with others.

Not quite as bad as this, but close.

Why do you have to be such a bitch?

PH would like to know this about one of the coordinators she works with.   Said coordinator is leaving at the end of next month.  PH has been a ‘lame duck’ before.  She knows what it’s like.  In situations like these, she understands the best way to go forward is to be completely positive and make oneself available to help everyone.  The Coordinator seems to have received different instructions.  For the most part she’s spent the past few weeks being a passive aggressive bitch – snidely making comments and questioning each and ever e-mail the PH sends.  While PH is doing the VAST majority of grunt work for this process, she wonders, why can’t the coordinator just keep her see-you-next-Tuesday mouth shut?

Clean up on Aisle 5.

With PH’s motivation waning, she’s decided to let some things go.  She no longer completes the weekly work in progress.  She is back to writing at work.  And yesterday, she realized that without her taking action the job board on her company’s website is grossly overrun with outdated jobs.  Not 1 or 2, but at least 10.  What PH finds amusing in all this is that the Director is so out of sync with her own department, she doesn’t even realize this is going on.

A visual interpretation of the job board's current status.

Names.

Being a recruiter, PH looks at a lot of names on a daily basis.   One of the new members of the team has this tweak on her name:  Tine.  Short for Kristine.

Just, no, and why would you?

A debilitating week.

PH has had some bad weeks in other jobs, but this may go down as one of the worst.  Due to the constant slaps, kicks, and ‘you’re not doing a good job’ she has lost almost all motivation to even come to work.  She can deal with almost anything, but constantly being micromanaged and ripped apart for anything from the wording of a basic e-mail to things she has no control over has forced her to look towards resigning.  No job is worth being made to feel like you are less than you really are.  And certainly not at the rate PH is making.  She took this job because she was able to help the world in some small way – to recruit individuals to go into fragile states and post-conflict zones so that they might do some good work.  Now, her entire life exists to attempt to make two controlling egomaniacs feel better about themselves.  The placements she’s doing aren’t helping the world.  The people she finds are never good enough.  She never hears a thank you.  She’s become someone she doesn’t want to be.

Watch this space.  PH is hopeful she can make it another two weeks until vacation but isn’t sure she has it in her.

This is how bad it is.

PH has actually wished for the following:

1.  To get sick so she won’t have to go to work

2.  For the entire project management to get sick, so she’ll have some time to catch up

3.  When she goes on holiday in less than 3 weeks, for the volcano in Iceland to explode and she and Hubs would get stuck in Amsterdam.

4.  To have some sudden need to go home.

This is the best case scenario.

Tabs.

So, PH likes to try and run a clean space on her desktop.  She keeps things filed in logical folders, and during her working day generally only has 3-4 tabs open at the bottom of her PC (Lotus Notes, Word, Firefox and perhaps Excel or a folder).  When she sat with the Belgian yesterday, her colleague had no less than 50 things open at the bottom of her screen.  It gave PH a headache just to look at.

So, what does your computer screen look like?  Tens of tabs?  Less than five?  Over 50?

This x 10.

Wearing of clothes.

As PH has previously mentioned, she is not a clothes horse, nor does she care too much for fashion.  Her workday look is mainly black, grey and white.  She has some pinstripes, a suit when she needs it, and black ballet flats which match everything.  Given she lives in the Middle East, and it is now the height of summer, her clothes washing cycle has increased.  As with many places in the city, there are a plethora of dry cleaning choices.  In fact, many will come directly to your door – such that you never even have to leave your apartment to pay for or drop off your garments.

PH tells this backstory because the Belgian regularly wears 1 or 2 dresses.

A week.

As in, 2 outfits for 5 days.

When it’s over 100 degrees out.

PH is perplexed.  In a city with more malls per capita than just about anywhere else in the world, she wonders why a person in their 30’s would only cycle through 2 (poorly fitting) dresses in a week.

Dry cleaners are our friends.